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BYU Defense Wins the Day in First Fall Camp Scrimmage

Originally posted on BYU Cougars on SI
By Casey Lundquist | Last updated Aug 9, 2025 4:31 PM ET

On Saturday, the BYU football wrapped up a scrimmage that included over 100 plays, head coach Kalani Sitake told the media. Sitake noted that the defense won the day.

"[I] really feel good about the work that we got in," Sitake said. "I obviously have to watch the film, but that's exactly what I wanted to see...usually in the first scrimmage [the defense is ahead of the offense]. Defense got the better of the day for, for our team."

Sitake noted that while the defense was really sound, they didn't force any turnovers on Saturday. There were a few administrative penalties that need to be cleaned up, something that is common for the first scrimmage. "Usually it's easier to get the defensive defensive side going first, but offensive side will usually respond. It's good to get this going because then offense will respond next week," Sitake said.

Sitake was encouraged by the progress for the first scrimmage. "It wasn't a horrible day for [the offense]," Sitake said. " It was just was a really good defensive day...they didn't win every rep, but man, they, they were really, really good, and if they play at that level, I feel really good about it. Offensively, we did some really good things, but it just comes down to the execution....I'm not down on the offense. I've coached long enough now, especially as a head coach, to know what to look for in scrimmage one and, and what I saw was really good."

BYU defensive coordinator Jay Hill said the defense "should" be ahead of the offense after the first couple weeks of Fall Camp. "The defense should be ahead in the first scrimmage normally," Hill said. "We have some veteran guys that played a lot of football, and I think getting them out there together today was a huge deal for us, and I thought they played well together. We don't have the burden of execution like the offense...Now our guys responded well and did some good things, but I would say for the first scrimmage I feel good about where we're at, but we're not content ever and we're heading in the right direction."

BYU offensive coordinator Aaron Roderick said Saturday highlighted the importance of scrimmaging during Fall Camp. "A little bit sloppy," Roderick said of the offense. "We've been playing well in practice and having a good amount of success...one of the reasons why it's important to scrimmage in the stadium, I believe, is there's something about going in that stadium and playing in a game-like situation with with a real Big 12 officiating crew. You learn quickly that some of the little mistakes that you get away with in practice...those things get exposed in a scrimmage-like setting with a real officiating crew and I thought we learned some good lessons today."

Roderick continued, saying he is not "freaked out" by the offensive performance. "I'm not down or freaked out by it. We did a lot of good things today too, but that was the biggest takeaway I got today was just our younger players, especially, learning that when you go in the stadium, man, you gotta to be locked in and you've got to execute...It's part of the process of getting there is you have to go have this type of scrimmage and and learn those lessons and the next time we scrimmage, hopefully next week sometime, hopefully we'll be better and keep taking steps towards being ready to play a game."

The Cougars will continue Fall Camp on Monday.